“Arrest” of Boualem Sansal: His lawyer promises to be “vigilant”

Mandated by Éditions Gallimard to take part in the defense of the writer Boualem Sansal arrested in Algeria, lawyer François Zimeray promised to be “vigilant” in “respecting his right to a fair trial”, in a press release sent to AFP on Sunday by the editor.

“The arrest of a writer for his opinions always violates fundamental freedoms,” says the human rights lawyer and former French ambassador to Denmark.

“We will be vigilant regarding respect for his right to a fair trial, in accordance with the international commitments subscribed to by Algeria,” he continues.

“Very worrying”

On Friday, the Algerian government agency APS confirmed the “arrest” of the 75-year-old writer, without specifying a date. According to several media, Boualem Sansal was arrested on November 16 at Algiers airport, coming from France.

The fate of the Franco-Algerian writer, in the fight against religious fundamentalism and authoritarianism, worries political and literary circles. On Sunday, the president of the Goncourt Academy, the writer Philippe Claudel, judged the silence surrounding the disappearance of Boualem Sansal “very worrying” on Franceinfo. “The literary world is mobilizing, but this mobilization is symbolic because we have no power,” he regretted.

His “immediate release”

Thirty winners of the grand prize of the French Academy also launched an appeal on Sunday to the Algerian authorities “to ensure the physical protection and respect of the basic rights of our friend”, in a column published on the website of the daily Le Figaro.

On Saturday, several Nobel Prize winners for literature, including the Frenchwoman Annie Ernaux and the Turk Orhan Pamuk, also asked for her “immediate release”, in a column published on the website of the weekly Le Point, at the initiative of another Franco-Algerian writer, Kamel Daoud, winner of the Goncourt 2024.

According to Le Monde, the Algerian authorities may have taken badly his statements to the French media Frontières, reputed to be far-right, which take up the Moroccan position according to which the country’s territory was truncated under French colonization for the benefit of Algeria.

A “useful puppet”

The official Algerian press agency APS criticized France on Friday for taking “the defense of a Holocaust denier who calls into question the existence, independence, history, sovereignty and borders of Algeria,” calling Boualem Sansal a “useful puppet”.

These events take place in a tense diplomatic context between France and Algeria, after Paris’ support for the Moroccan autonomy plan for the disputed territory of Western Sahara at the end of July.

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